The Greatest Works of Émile Gaboriau. Emile Gaboriau
second son.
A strict observer of traditional rights, he had always declared that the eldest son of a noble house should inherit all the family possessions, and that he intended to leave Gaston his entire fortune.
This flagrant injustice and favoritism inspired Louis with envious hatred for his brother.
Gaston always said that he would never consent to profit by this paternal partiality, but would share equally with his brother. Judging others by himself, Louis placed no faith in this assertion, which he called an ostentatious affectation of generosity.
Although this hatred was unsuspected by the marquis and Gaston, it was betrayed by acts significant enough to attract the attention of the servants, who often commented upon it.
They were so fully aware of Louis’s sentiments toward his brother that, when he was prevented from escaping because of the stumbling horse, they refused to believe it an accident; and, whenever Louis came near would mutter, “Fratricide!”
A deplorable scene took place between Louis and St. Jean, who was allowed, on account of his fifty years’ faithful service, to take liberties which he sometimes abused by making rough speeches to his superiors.
“It is a great pity,” said the old servant, “that a skilful rider like yourself should have fallen at the very moment when your brother’s life depended upon your horsemanship.”
At this broad insinuation, Louis turned pale, and threateningly cried out:
“You insolent dog, what do you mean?”
“You know well enough what I mean, monsieur,” the old man said, significantly.
“I do not know! Explain your impertinence: speak, I tell you!”
The man only answered by a meaning look, which so incensed Louis that he rushed toward him with upraised whip, and would have beaten him unmercifully, had not the other servants interfered, and dragged St. Jean from the spot.
This altercation occurred while Gaston was in the madder-field trying to escape his pursuers.
After a while the gendarmes and hussars returned, with slow tread and sad faces, to say that Gaston de Clameran had plunged into the Rhone, and was instantly drowned.
This melancholy news was received with groans and tears by everyone save Louis, who remained calm and unmoved: not a single muscle of his face quivered.
But his eyes sparkled with triumph. A secret voice cried within him, “Now you are assured of the family fortune, and a marquis’s coronet.”
He was no longer the poverty-stricken younger son, but the sole heir of the Clamerans.
The corporal of the gendarmes had said:
“I would not be the one to tell the poor old man that his son is drowned.”
Louis felt none of the tender-hearted scruples of the brave old soldier. He instantly went to his father’s sick-room, and said, in a firm voice:
“My brother had to choose between disgrace and death; he is dead.”
Like a sturdy oak stricken by lightning, the marquis tottered and fell when these fatal words sounded in his ears. The doctor soon arrived, but alas! only to say that science was of no avail.
Toward daybreak, Louis, without a tear, received his father’s last sigh.
Louis was now the master.
All the unjust precautions taken by the marquis to elude the law, and insure beyond dispute the possession of his entire fortune to his eldest son, turned against him.
By means of a fraudulent deed of trust drawn by his dishonest lawyer, M. de Clameran had disposed everything so that, on the day of his death, every farthing he owned would be Gaston’s.
Louis alone was benefited by this precaution. He came into possession without even being called upon for the certificate of his brother’s death.
He was now Marquis of Clameran; he was free, he was comparatively rich. He who had never had twenty-five crowns in his pocket at once, now found himself the possessor of two hundred thousand francs.
This sudden, unexpected fortune so completely turned his head that he forgot his skilful dissimulation. His demeanor at the funeral of the marquis was much censured. He followed the coffin, with his head bowed and his face buried in a handkerchief; but this did not conceal the buoyancy of his spirit, and the joy which sparkled in his eyes.
The day after the funeral, Louis sold everything that he could dispose of, horses, carriages, and family plate.
The next day he discharged all the old servants, who had hoped to end their days beneath the hospitable roof of Clameran. Several, with tears in their eyes, took him aside, and entreated him to let them stay without wages. He roughly ordered them to be gone, and never appear before his eyes again.
He sent for his father’s lawyer, and gave him a power of attorney to sell the estate, and received in return the sum of twenty thousand francs as the first payment in advance.
At the close of the week, he locked up the chateau, with a vow never to cross its sill again, and left the keys in the keeping of St. Jean, who owned a little house near Clameran, and would continue to live in the neighborhood.
Poor St. Jean! little did he think that, in preventing Valentine from seeing Louis, he had ruined the prospects of his beloved Gaston.
On receiving the keys he asked one question:
“Shall we not search for your brother’s body, M. the marquis?” he inquired in broken-hearted tones. “And, if it is found, what must be done with it?”
“I shall leave instructions with my notary,” replied Louis. And he hurried away from Clameran as if the ground burnt his feet. He went to Tarascon, where he had already forwarded his baggage, and took the stage-coach which travelled between Marseilles and Paris, the railroad not yet being finished.
At last he was off. The lumbering old stage rattled along, drawn by six horses; and the deep gullies made by the wheels seemed so many abysses between the past and the future.
Lying back in a corner of the stage, Louis de Clameran enjoyed in anticipation the fields of pleasure spread before his dazzled eyes. At the end of the journey, Paris rose up before him, radiant, brilliantly dazzling as the sun.
Yes, he was going to Paris, the promised land, the city of wonders, where every Aladdin finds a lamp. There all ambitions are crowned, all dreams realized, all passions, all desires, good and evil, can be satisfied.
There the fast-fleeting days are followed by nights of ever-varied pleasure and excitement. In twenty theatres tragedy weeps, or comedy laughs; whilst at the opera the most beautiful women in the world, sparkling with diamonds, are ready to die with ecstasy at the sound of divine music; everywhere noise, excitement, luxury, and pleasure.
What a dream! The heart of Louis de Clameran was swollen with desire, and he felt that he should go mad if the horses crawled with such torturing slowness: he would like to spring from the old stage, and fly to his haven of delight.
He never once thought of the past with a pang of regret. What mattered it to him how his father and brother had died? All his energies were devoted to penetrating the mysterious future that now awaited him.
Was not every chance in his favor? He was young, rich, handsome, and a marquis. He had a constitution of iron; he carried twenty thousand francs in his pocket, and would soon have ten times as many more.
He, who had always been poor, regarded this sum as an exhaustless treasure.
And at nightfall, when he jumped from the stage upon the brilliantly lighted street of Paris, he seemed to be taking possession of the grand city, and felt as though he could buy everything in it.
His illusions were those natural to all young men who suddenly come into possession of a patrimony after years of privation.
It is this ignorance